Hungry for More: Romantic Fantasies for Women - just published! With stories by Tiffany Reisz, Greta Christina, D.L. King and more. 21 fantasies, from "Kitchen Slut" to a cougar to Craigslist sex to BDSM to bukkake to watching two men get it on, and more!

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Thought you might want to see how a blurb becomes a blurb. My editor at Seal Press, Brooke Warner, asked me to check out Girldrive. I will post more about it closer to the pub date, but here's what I sent her:

"Girldrive is a fascinating, fiery, dramatic whirlwind tour through modern-day women’s lives. Aronowitz and Bernstein treat feminism both as sacred and something that can, and is, being refashioned, and in some cases, dismissed in favor of other ways of advancing change. Thankfully, they don’t only talk to self-described 'feminists,' but to all sorts of women of different ages, races, sexualities, and belief systems. Girldrive is very likely to make you excited, impassioned, and, at times, infuriated--and that’s a good thing. Rather than handing you preformatted answers, Girldrive lets its diversity of opinion speak to you, rather than for you."

I knew this was pretty long, but I have trouble cutting myself down, so this is what they went with:

"Girldrive is a fascinating, fiery, dramatic whirlwind tour through modern-day women's lives. It's likely to make you excited, impassioned, and at times infuriated‹and that's a good thing. It lets its diversity of opinion speak to you rather than for you."

I've been thinking about blurbs as I gather them for Peep Show: Tales of Voyeurs and Exhibitionists, which is kindof my birthday book, because it's coming out in November, and my birthday is November 10th. I realized that they're not just for the back cover of the book. I'm going to put mine on the book's postcards, on the blog, have my publicist put it on the press release.

I'm also just a book nerd, and like reading blurbs, like this one for Danny Evan's Rage Against the Meshugenah: Why it Takes Balls to Go Nuts:

"A sort of self-help book on crack, for the modern man.”—Rebecca Woolf, author of Rockabye

I'd buy that, even though I'm not a man (and interestingly, the other blurb on Amazon was also from a woman).

Monday, June 29, 2009

If you're a woman and a writer, do yourself a favor and check out the newly launched Shewrites.com - I just joined and it looks like a fantastic online and offline community.

I was hoping to make their event this evening but I was just too overwhelmed, and I've found that when I'm barely social and have tons of work piled up, it doesn't make any sense to go out, even to show off my now month-old Fluevogs I still haven't worn. There will be time, and in the meantime, I have 100 pages (aka half) of Please, Sir done and am hoping I get some great submissions in by Wednesday's deadline for the other half. Then I will tackle Please, Ma'am. I'm glad I have that to work on because my writing's been so half-assed lately. I've started a ton of things and whether I'll finish them in time, who knows.

No idea if it'll be like Jill Soloway's classic story "Courteney Cox's Asshole," or what, but I will check it out this weekend and see.

Speaking of women, writing, and memoirs, the one I'm reading now is Perfection: A Memoir of Betrayal and Renewal by Julie Metz. After her husband died, she found evidence that he'd been having affairs with five women, and confronted them all. It's intense. She also has a six-year-old daughter (at age 44) and basically has to confront whether her entire 16-year marriage was a sham. See the recent New York Times article, "One Dead Husband and 5 Other Women."

Erin Donovan interviewed me yesterday for her podcast Steady Diet of Film. We talked about Humpday, independent film, sexuality, The Blair Witch Project, Bruno, and more. Be warned, though, there are spoilers (I warn in the audio too, but still).

Plus there'll be red-hot flavored cupcakes by Glittle Cupcakes. (the above ring pop one is also by them, but I'm not sure if those exact ones will be there)

On July 8th, Fugu Press will release “Scarlett Takes Manhattan,” the first graphic novel by Dr. Sketchy’s creator Molly Crabapple and her longtime collaborator John Leavitt.Set in the demimonde of Gilded Age New York, “Scarlett Takes Manhattan” tells the story of poor Bowery girl Shifra Helfgott, who rises to become the premier fire-eater of her age.

Chock full of rigged boxing matches, dirty politics, and turn of the century lesbian culture, “Scarlett” has been described as “disgustingly wonderful” by Warren Ellis and led Margaret Cho to call Molly “THE artist of our time.”

To celebrate the release of “Scarlett Takes Manhattan,” Fugu Press will be throwing a glittery, burlesque-inspired launch at The Slipper Room, New York’s premier variety venue.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

Sadly, as I thought I already posted (it didn't go through anywhere but Flickr), I did not make it to Kansas City this weekend. I'm mostly over it, though still a bit annoyed at being stuck in New York, but do need to share why I hope I never will buy a ticket from Delta Airlines again.

I got to the airport at 5:40 for my 6:50 flight from LaGuardia to Kansas City, MO, last night. I had rearranged my day to do so and got a car service ($25 plus $7 tip). As I was arriving, around 5:30, I got a call saying the flight was delayed until 8:50. Then once I checked in, as I was about to head to the gate, I got a call saying my flight was cancelled due to "weather."

Yes, we had a flash storm, that sucked. BUT other planes were taking off, and if the flight had left when it was supposed to, at 8:50, that storm would've been long over. Instead, Delta rebooked me on a flight tonight, which I wasn't about to take only to spend less than 24 hours in Kansas City. They are refunding me my full $199.20 but in addition to the time wasted, I could've saved the $32 in car service fare if they had only told me a bit earlier that the flight was delayed. Then I'd have been home when they told me it was cancelled. But no, stupid Delta didn't do that.

The one good thing is that I discovered I could take the M60 bus using my Metrocard, and therefore didn't have to pay anything to return. Still, I'm pissed because they cancelled a ton of fights and there was no reason for it that I can see, and while they did call and email, it was too late. They should've done it sooner, and Delta has lost me as a customer.

Which reminds me, I have to book my Minneapolis trip, and will be booking a new non-Delta trip to Kansas City for sometime in August. I wish I hadn't wasted so many other days this year, but I'm already mentally plotting where I want to go in 2010: Seattle, Las Vegas, Chicago.

I did walk a lot in New York today, and read most of the Please, Sir submissions awaiting me. I have about half the book filled, which means I still need a good 10-12 more stories, so please send them in! (Properly formatted ONLY, see guidelines for details - it's a record high for poor formatting this time around.) For once in my life, I am determined to file Please, Sir and Please, Ma'am early. That feels great because I don't like the idea of having too many books to work on at once, and I need that sense of completion for my own sanity. Next week is also the deadline for a bunch of anthologies I want to submit to, so I'm gonna use this weekend to finish all these half-done stories. I hope to, anyway. And catch up on season 1 of Mad Men so I'm ready for season 2 on DVD July 14th.

I will post later, but I'm back to the drawing board with Best Sex Writing 2010 and trying to finalize my July readers for In The Flesh. It is nice to have an entire weekend all to myself with no plans though; hope I can remember that. I also looked at glasses at Facial Index, lusting over a green pair but I have to mull it over. At least when I do get to KC, I will look better than I do now: good glasses, haircut, etc.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

So I have this headache. I think it's related to my period, but whatever it is, it's really freaking annoying. Yesterday and today I've felt tired, woozy, achy, grouchy, exhausted and, yes, I have a headache. Today I took some Excedrin in the early afternoon and this evening, Motrin, and am a little better, but seriously, it sucks. I hope I'm better by the time I hope on a plane tomorrow night to Kansas City.

The National Headache Foundation exists to enhance the healthcare of headache sufferers. It is a source of help to sufferers' families, physicians who treat headache sufferers, allied healthcare professionals and to the public. The NHF accomplishes its mission by providing educational and informational resources, supporting headache research and advocating for the understanding of headache as a legitimate neurobiological disease.

I shall post more this weekend. I'm all about cupcakes, BBQ, hanging out with Emily Farris, and seeing Kansas City. Next week I want to get frames at Fabulous Fanny's because, well, I can't seem to find my purple glasses, yet I know they are in my home. Horrible, perhaps, but having a spare spare pair can't hurt and will definitely improve my self-esteem because wearing my ugly old glasses makes me feel like I've instantly made myself way less attractive. Yes, the old "cleaning my apartment" is on my to do list for this summer/year/life, but in the meantime, I'm gonna go for something retro.

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Many thanks to Galleycat editor (and friend) Jason Boog for having me on the Mediabistro Morning Media Menu podcast this morning on Blogtalkradio. We discussed Chris Anderson, Wikipedia, and his new book Free, Dick Cheney's $2 million memoir deal, the erotica genre, my IPPY Awards, and book trailers. It was a lot of fun and they've been having and have some great guests planned, so listen in every weekday or listen to the archives.

Thanks also to the other guest (and soon to be co-host) Matt Van Hoven of Agencyspy for posting my 2009 Sex Blogger Calendar photo and Do Not Disturb book trailer.

And you may or may not know that I met one of my closets friends, Twanna A. Hines of Funky Brown Chick, by appearing on her former Blogtalkradio podcast Dating Roadkill, way back in February 2007. It was a momentous, life-changing night for me in many ways (not necessarily because of the podcast, but that was part of it), and the catalyst for change, starting the next day, and much later. Sorry to be cagey - I will write about it more when I can. There aren't that many specific days I can pick out and say, "That one changed me, taught me something valuable," but that is one of them.

My basic point was that at the time, Twanna was just a name on an email, a voice over the phone. Then in October 2007 we met at a party and it was this instant recognition and we've pretty much been hanging out ever since.

Carolyn Kellogg at the LA Times' book blog Jacket Copy quoted me extensively about the whole "women can't write about sex" story that The Erotic Review editor Kate Copstick has stirred up.

Here's a snippet of what I emailed to Kellogg:

I think the number one critical element is honesty, meaning using your most natural voice to write about sex. Trying to make it sound more 'porn-like' by deliberately using words that you wouldn’t normally use almost always reads in a stilted, clichéd way. Honesty, too, about sexual desire; I think part of why so many writers, male and female, use pseudonyms (approximately half of the authors in my erotica anthologies) is because it allows them more freedom to go to the often dark, disturbing, odd, etc. places their sexual imagination takes them.

Make sure to click through for the HOT kissing photo (by someone called masochismtango on Flickr, an awesome Flickr name if I've ever heard one!).

I get a lot of Facebook (yes, I got my vanity URL, whatever that's worth) friend requests from people I don't know. I don't add them back (sorry, just a personal preference).

However, you can also become my fan on Facebook. I haven't done much with that yet just because it's so new, but you can also join the In The Flesh Reading Series group on Facebook, which I send updates to every month. (I've heard some people have had trouble joining, so if you do have trouble, email me at rachelkb at gmail.com and I'll see about fixing it.)

Many thanks to Brooke at Bluestockings for inviting me to read there. The store is awesome; there were so many books I coveted, but I settled on Ariel Schrag's amazing senior year of high school in comic form Likewise and a copy of $pread magazine.

I bought 100 mini cupcakes from Baked by Melissa for the reading and they were a huge hit, plus I heard about two new (to me) places to get cupcakes, in Queens and Brooklyn.

Kathleen Warnock read about old friends who share a very steamy phone call

Bevin Branlandingham read about fisting in the woods (sorry about the blurriness)

Thanks to everyone who came out!

I read my story "Fist First" from Up All Night: Adventures in Lesbian Sex, my very first book (and it shows) from back in 2004. I had brought two other potential stories, but when I saw the book there, I decided to read that. That story is pretty old, and took place in, I think, 2001, but still held up. One woman told me afterward that she related, which made me feel like it had done its job.

It was so strange to see it in the store. I don't blog about it much because I was very naïve and took a $1,000 flat fee from Alyson to co-edit the book with Stacy Bias (though in reality, I did almost all, if not all, the selecting and editing). It was presented to me as a done deal (Stacy had signed her contract that way). In retrospect, I'd be thousands of dollars better off had I taken no advance and asked for royalties, but I didn't know back then. I also have no idea how it's sold...because I don't get royalty statements, though a few years ago I had someone check on Bookscan and had heard via word of mouth that it was doing well.

The point is, I'm so glad I know better now, and that Cleis Press would never think of asking me to edit books for no royalties. (I do get royalties for my Alyson anthology First-Timers, and would on the Fetish Chest series of Ultimate Undies, Sexiest Soles and Secret Slaves...if anyone had bought them. Oh well.) That's why I like editing anthologies, because even if you mess up, there is always a next time, a chance to figure out what went wrong, sales or marketing or topic-wise, and do better.

And even though I only got that measly $1,000, having that book become a Lambda Literary Award finalist and just having it out there helped put me on the map as an erotica editor and get me other gigs, so in many ways, it was worth it, but is a shame and I wouldn't recommend anyone agree to those terms unless it's strictly a work-for-hire type thing, or you don't expect it to sell, or whatever. Also, having someone advise you in those situations (not necessarily an agent for $1,000, that also doesn't really make financial sense), but someone to look things over and point out anything you may have missed in the contract, is probably a good idea too. Said all in hindsight, of course.

I'm working on finalizing a date for a fall reading at WORD in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and would love to teach Erotica 101 in NYC again, if I can find a host. I'm reading at Charlie Vazquez's PANIC! reading series at Nowhere Bar (14th Street between 1st and 2nd) on August 26th too.

Downtown’s king of comedy and master of off-the-cuff repartee, MURRAY HILL, a.k.a. “the hardest working middle-aged man in show business,” is pleased to announce two special live shows for the taping of his first-ever comedy album. He has put together a Las Vegas lounge-style show based on his nightclub act from the past decade to record his album.

Murray will be performing his trademark blend of hammy Borscht Belt humor, irreverent monologues, so-bad-it’s-gotta-be-good crooning, biting celebrity impersonations, freewheeling ad-libbing, and raucous audience interaction. He’ll regale the audience with tales from his early showbiz days—like getting discovered by Don Rickles while bussing tables at The Copacabana; opening for the guy who opened for the guy who opened for Martin and Lewis; his trailblazing spoon-playing beginnings; his disastrous mayoral campaign against Giuliani; his fifth career comeback and chronic middle-aged crisis; and, of course, cavorting with and losing the ladies (including one of his 12 ex-fiancés, who dumped him for Regis Philbin).

Murray will debut new original songs penned with his pianist and other members of his band that have never been performed before an audience. He’ll be accompanied by pianist PAUL LESCHEN and FISHERMAN’S XLYPHONIC ORCHERSTRA with BRIAN NEWMAN blowing his horn.

The evening will also feature two new videos shot and directed by MARY C. MATTHEWS: “Murray 101,” Murray’s backstory with archival footage from his days as a neglected toddler, to slugging it out in the nightclubs, to his current status as comic veteran; and “Tie Biz” a video showcase of Murray’s vast collection of vintage polyester ties.

And Friday night I'll be heading to Kansas City, so I will miss The Candy Janes at Comix. They're new to me but sound fun: "Sultry and Salty Dance Cabaret."

Monday, June 22, 2009

I'm looking for a published, well-known author to replace Lily Burana on July 16th at True Sex Confessions Night at In The Flesh Reading Series. Is that you? Email me at rachelkb at gmail.com - thanks! I was really excited and now I'm still excited but also need to make sure we get a good crowd. I've got some great people in September (Susan Shapiro, Amy Sohn) and then in October I'm bringing Comedy Sex Night back...though sadly I will be in San Francisco at Litquake. Not sadly, Carolyn Castiglia, aka Miss CKC, will be hosting some hilarious comedians. November will be Spanking Erotica Night and sometime after that...I hope to have Julie Powell (author of Julie and Julia and Cleaving) for Sex and Food Night. Fingers crossed!

Also...I am looking for a NYC-based intern for In The Flesh. I would need your help on the 3rd Thursday of the month helping me get organized for the readings and also about 2 hours a month of promotional work in between. I can't pay, but I can give you books, drink tickets, and give you a little glimpse into the behind the scenes of running a reading series. Email me at rachelkb at gmail.com with "Intern" in subject line. Thanks!

Just a few thoughts, as I'm reading Please, Sir submissions. Editing anthologies is tricky because you have to find the best stories, but you also have to find stories that will read well together, in a row. I think part of the problem may be with my titles, which are tentative. When authors see Please, Sir and Please, Ma'am, they think their story needs to have a literal "Sir" and "Ma'am." And some of them are fabulous, and I'm looking forward to publishing them.

The only problem is that I can't have 20 stories that all have umpteen "Please, Sir" and "Please, Ma'am"s in them, because that would get boring. It's a tough thing to stress in guidelines, because I do need some of that, but ideally, all the tops, and all the narrators, will be different enough, yet have their kink in common. It's very much an "I know it when I see it" thing, but I guess if I had one piece of advice I'd say don't force it. If the characters work with that terminology, go for it. But if they don't, for my books, anyway, think of the spirit of what I'm going for. The spirit of submission, in this case. I'm really excited about these books; apparently, Yes, Sir has been doing well at Borders, and I hope the same goes for these. I love reading submissions, especially since it gives me something productive to do when I'm stalled on my own writing, which would be now...not a good time to be stalled when a ton of deadlines are next week.

And again, this is not about any specific submission. I've gotten some really amazing ones. And far more galling to me are the people who don't indent; again, it may seem like no big deal, but it is, to this editor anyway.

Usually I turn my books in to Cleis, well, let's just say I think they were bowled over when I filed Best Sex Writing 2010 two weeks early. I'm looking forward to getting that lineup finalized and am working on bestsexwriting.com, well, I have hired Brian Van to make it for me. There are other pieces of writing that are lingering, awaiting my attention, but for now, that's what I'm up to. Escaping to Kansas City, Missouri this weekend to visit the wonderful Emily Farris of Scanner and casserole fame.

I am still gathering my thoughts about Humpday (very good, but not what I expected exactly), which I saw at BAM on Saturday. I'll be in Kansas City but if you haven't seen it and want to before it hits theaters July 10th, check this out.

“Straight guys can be funny fellows. Don’t get me wrong, I love ‘em to death, but the way they seem capable of turning any situation into a game of one-upmanship–even with their closest buddies–can be a pretty awesome spectacle. ‘Humpday’ takes this syndrome of hetero guy competitiveness to a new, ironic extreme: two straight friends outduding each other by attempting to do each other.”

I think it's interesting that a woman made a film about straight male sexuality and its boundaries, and there are so many women (Shira Tarrant, Deborah Siegel) writing about manhood these days. Would love to see, well, men tackling sex a little more often.

FRIDAY, June 26 Rooftop Films and Magnolia Pictures Present HUMPDAY When Andrew unexpectedly shows up on Ben's doorstep late one night, the two old college friends immediately fall into their old dynamic of heterosexual one-upmanship. To save Ben from domestication, Andrew invites Ben to a party at a sex-positive commune. Everyone there plans on making erotic art films for the local amateur porn festival and Andrew wants in. They run out of booze and ideas, save for one: Andrew should have sex with Ben, on camera. It's not gay; it's beyond gay. It's not porn; it's an art project. The next day, they find themselves unable to back down from the dare. And there's nothing standing in their way - except Ben's wife Anna, heterosexuality, and certain mechanical questions. Lynn Shelton (My Effortless Brilliance, Summer Series 2008) returns to the roof with Humpday, a hilarious and poignant new comedy. In many ways, Shelton’s film is constructed like a classic Hollywood high-concept comedy—one can almost imagine Steve Carrell and Seth Rogen playing the leads in a film with the same logline. But Shelton doesn’t settle for the cheap contrived laughs, and the naturalistic dialogue--entirely improvised on-set--creates an exhilarating sense of immediacy and realism. The looseness of the dialogue and the sharpness of the plot structure allows Humpday to feel at once invigoratingly real, yet at the same time hilariously and outrageously absurd. Venue: on the roof of the Open Road Rooftop Address: 350 Grand Street @ Essex (Lower East Side, Manhattan) 8:00PM: Doors open 8:30PM: Sound Fix presents live music The Antlers 9:00PM: Films 11:30PM - 1:00AM: Open Bar at Fontana’s (105 Eldridge St), courtesy of Radeberger beer Tickets: $9-$25: http://newyork.going.com/event-602767;Rooftop_Films_Humpday#No refunds. In the event of rain, the show will be indoors at the same locations. Seating is first come, first served. Physical seats are limited. This means you may not get a chair. You are welcome to bring a blanket and sit picnic-style, but NO ALCOHOL IS PERMITTED.

Sunday, June 21, 2009

Busy weekend, was in Danbury, CT Friday night, heading to NJ today for Father's Day, saw Lynn Shelton's film Humpday finally last night! Sadly, I haven't written a word and there are a ton of anthology deadlines coming up, so I have to get cracking tonight.

Here's the new Culturebot t-shirt, as modeled by me, click here to purchase:

Since the infamous April 2006 True Sex Confessions reading at In The Flesh with Jessica Cutler, Josh Kilmer-Purcell, Dan Allen, Felicia Sullivan, Miriam Datskovsky and Judy McGuire, True Sex Confessions Night has proven the most popular of the In The Flesh theme nights, with audience participation and hot/wild/crazy/fun/disturbing/unforgettable true sex stories. And producing this amazing photo:

In The Flesh is bringing back our most popular segment, True Sex Confessions Night! Featuring memoirist Lily Burana (I Love a Man in Uniform, Strip City), Mike Edison (I Have Fun Everywhere I Go), Melissa Gira Grant (Sexerati.com), Megan Carpentier (Jezebel.com), Blaise K (How I Learned Reading Series), and Maria Diaz. Hosted and curated by Rachel Kramer Bussel (Best Sex Writing 2009, The Mile High Club, Spanked). Free candy, cookies, chips and 100 mini cupcakes by Baked by Melissa will be served. Authors' book swill be available for sale by Mobile Libris. Audience members will have the opportunity to anonymously share their true sex confessions throughout the night (via index cards that will be read aloud between readers). Free copies of the word game SexySlang will be given away.

In the Flesh is a monthly reading series hosted at the appropriately named Happy Ending Lounge, and features the country's best erotic writers sharing stories to get you hot and bothered, hosted and curated by acclaimed erotic writer and editor Rachel Kramer Bussel. From erotic poetry to down and dirty smut, these authors get naked on the page and will make you lust after them and their words. Since its debut in October 2005, In the Flesh has featured such authors as Laura Antoniou, Mo Beasley, Susie Bright, Lily Burana, Jessica Cutler, Stephen Elliott, Valerie Frankel, Polly Frost, Gael Greene, Andy Horwitz, Debra Hyde, Maxim Jakubowski, Emily Scarlet Kramer of CAKE, Josh Kilmer-Purcell, Edith Layton, Logan Levkoff, Suzanne Portnoy, Sofia Quintero, M.J. Rose, Lauren Sanders, Danyel Smith, Grant Stoddard, Cecilia Tan, Carol Taylor, Dana Vachon, Veronica Vera, Susan Wright, Zane and many others. The series has gotten press attention from the New York Times’s UrbanEye, Escape (Hong Kong), Flavorpill, The L Magazine, New York Magazine, New York Observer, Philadelphia City Paper, Time Out New York, Flavorwire, Gothamist, Jezebel.com, Nerve.com and Wonkette, and has been praised by Dr. Ruth.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

In The Flesh alum Diana Cage is "reading about ex boyfriends who liked to wear my knickers" and Xan West is reading from "Nervous Boy:"

'Come on, boy. You can take it. I know you're strong enough.'

I drive my bootheel into the bruises on his thigh. I ram my elbow into the bruises on his pecs. He grunts, clenching his jaw. He's not sure he can do it, but he'll never admit it.

'Yes, Sir, I can take it,' he spits out, glaring at me, promising himself as much as me.

I build him up with punches and kicks. Show him I can see his strength by how hard I pound into him. My face is full of ferocity and pride and I pour all that into him, until it streams out in tears running down his face."

It's raining, but there will still be 100 FREE cupcakes from Baked by Melissa! (photo by Stacie Joy)

In the Flesh is a monthly reading series hosted at the appropriately named Happy Ending Lounge, and features the country's best erotic writers sharing stories to get you hot and bothered, hosted and curated by acclaimed erotic writer and editor Rachel Kramer Bussel. From erotic poetry to down and dirty smut, these authors get naked on the page and will make you lust after them and their words. Since its debut in October 2005, In the Flesh has featured such authors as Laura Antoniou, Mo Beasley, Susie Bright, Lily Burana, Jessica Cutler, Stephen Elliott, Valerie Frankel, Polly Frost, Gael Greene, Andy Horwitz, Debra Hyde, Maxim Jakubowski, Emily Scarlet Kramer of CAKE, Josh Kilmer-Purcell, Edith Layton, Logan Levkoff, Suzanne Portnoy, Sofia Quintero, M.J. Rose, Lauren Sanders, Danyel Smith, Grant Stoddard, Cecilia Tan, Carol Taylor, Dana Vachon, Veronica Vera, Susan Wright, Zane and many others. The series has gotten press attention from the New York Times’s UrbanEye, Escape (Hong Kong), Flavorpill, The L Magazine, New York Magazine, New York Observer, Philadelphia City Paper, Time Out New York, Gothamist, Nerve.com and Wonkette, and has been praised by Dr. Ruth.

Rachel Kramer Bussel is an author, editor, blogger and reading series host. She is Senior Editor at Penthouse Variations and a former sex columnist for The Village Voice. She’s edited numerous anthologies, two of which (Up All Night and Glamour Girls) have been Lambda Literary Award finalists, most recently The Mile High Club: Plane Sex Stories, Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories, Best Sex Writing 2009, Tasting Him, Tasting Her, and Spanked. Her writing been published in publications such as Clean Sheets, Cosmopolitan, The Daily Beast, Fresh Yarn, Huffington Post, Mediabistro, Newsday, New York Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Tango, The Village Voice, and Time Out New York, and in over 100 anthologies, including Best American Erotica 2004 and 2006. She has hosted In The Flesh since October 2005.www.rachelkramerbussel.com

Diana Cage is the author of three hilarious books on sex and dating: Girl Meets Girl: A Dating Survival Guide, Box Lunch: The Layperson’s Guide to Cunnilingus, and Threeways: Fulfill Your Ultimate Fantasy. She is the former host of The Diana Cage Show on Sirius XM and still pops up on the radio a couple of times a month to give advice on sex and love to lonelyhearts everywhere. Her writing has appeared in countless journals, anthologies and magazines and she currently writes on sex and politics for Shewired and Velvetpark. She is featured in the Here! Television series Lesbian Sex and Sexuality, and is now trying to figure out what's left to write about.www.dianacage.com

Kelli Dunham is a genderqueer Fresh Fruit award-winning comic, ex-nun and a Wisconsin farmgrrl gone very bad. She has two comedy CDs to her credit: I am NOT a 12 Year Old Boy and Almost Pretty and is the co-producer of Gayety, Brooklyn's experimental queer comedy cabaret. She is on the organizing board of the Butch Voices(www.butchvoices.com) and is the author of four published books of light hearted nonfiction and a frequent contributor to humorous anthologies. She is currently touring Pudding Day, an irreverent one boi show about her partner's struggle with cancer. In June she is launching the first of episode of Queerhouse Rock, an animated parody of the 1970 kids' cartoon series Schoolhouse Rock. She has performed at the Risque strip club in Philadelphia, at numerous churches, Lacrosse Wisconsin Pride, and a livestock auction. She once taught a nun to masturbate. With great success.www.kellidunham.com

Madlyn March is the pseudonym of a writer whose work has appeared in the anthology First-Timers, Black Table, AfterEllen, AfterElton, Complete Woman, The New York Post, Time Out New York, and others. Toni is based on a bully who once tortured her, but the sexual part is all wishful thinking.

Kimberly "Q" (aka The Lesbian Goddess) is the writer, creator and author of Orchids: African American Lesbian Erotica One Night Stands, Orchids II: Reality or Fantasy and her just released Lesbian Funk A Journey Into The Oblivion. She formed her company Women of Choice to signify the choices of life that we as women dare to explore with a mission to go beyond the realm of women's comfort zones and normalcy by providing them with exotic adventures, unexplained pleasures, new and exciting ideas and inexplicable desires. Her books are episodes presented to entice, entertain and broaden the thoughts, actions and creativity of the lesbian sexual experience. www.womenofchoice.com

Rob Stephenson's novel Passes Through will be published by Fiction Collective 2 in Spring of 2010. His novella U will be published later that year by Rebel Satori Press : Queer Mojo. Rob and Mikael Karlsson have made a CD called dog, now available from Please MusicWorks. They are currently working on new music that will be part of the Terry Riley Remixed CD released later this year by Innova Recordings.

Xan West is the pseudonym of an NYC BDSM and sex educator and writer. Xan's work can be found in Best SM Erotica 2, Got A Minute?, Love at First Sting, Best Women's Erotica 2008 and 2009, Men on the Edge, Leathermen, Backdraft: Firemen Erotica, DADDIES, Frenzy, Best Gay Erotica 2009, and the upcoming Cruising for Bad Boys, Pleasure Bound, and Sextime. Xan's story, "First Time Since", printed in Hurts So Good, won honorable mention for the 2008 National Leather Association's John Preston Short Fiction Award. Xan wants to hear from you, and can be found at xanwest.livejournal.com/ or emailed at xan_west at yahoo.com.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

I will have details on pricing/registration soon, but for now, if you're in Minneapolis or know someone who is, please mark your calendars for August 2nd, 7 pm. I'm heading back to Minneapolis to visit friends, eat cupcakes, go to the Fringe Festival, and teach Erotica 101 that Sunday night at one of my favorite sex toy stores, Smitten Kitten. I'm pretty sure there will be cupcakes involved too, in fact, I'll make sure of it!

When people ask how I came to write primarily about sex and relationships it’s easy to say something glib like “I enjoy the research,” but the truth is that I get a kid-at-Christmas thrill, a true sense of wonder at the sheer volume of different experiences everyone has with these topics. It doesn’t matter to me whether the wrapping paper is erotic, scientific, emotional or cultural – I can’t wait to tear it off and see what’s in there. Despite having been born in 1964 I was raised by people who were pacifists in the sexual revolution. Having started out with limited ideas on the subject, the more I learned (along with the rest of the country) the more interested I got. I have a friend who came to America from England as a child and said that the variety of cereals and cartoons suddenly available to him practically made his head explode. I kind of feel that way about S&R. I might not want to eat every crunchberry and mini marshmallow, but you bet I want to shake, feel up and sniff all the boxes.

That’s what’s so magically delicious about a book like Best Sex Writing 2009 (and in the fairness of disclosure, I was lucky enough to be in the 2008 edition). Award-winning editor Rachel Kramer Bussel, though an accomplished titilator herself, doesn’t go for tittilation, but rather stimulation, selecting pieces that arouse our senses of curiosity, indignation, wonder, humor, empathy and discomfort more than our bathing suit parts. It’s an elegant orchestration in which BSR contributor and MSNBC columnist Brian Alexander. says the reader will find “…a variety of answers to the larger questions of how Americans are adapting…to new opportunities for sexual exploration.” And it was gratifying to find that the pieces that made me uncomfortable (“One Rape to Go, Please” by Tracie Egan or that I doubted I’d relate to (“Sex is the Most Stressful Thing in the Universe” by Dan Vebber) ended up being stories I took as much pleasure as those I was sure I’d love (“An Open Letter to the Bush Administration” by Mistress Morgana Maye), possibly even more.

Also, some great news: Cleis is having me edit Best Sex Writing 2011 and 2012. Very excited! Guidelines will be out in the fall for next year's (2011) and in the meantime I'm working on setting up my just-purchased (last night) bestsexwriting.com and finalizing Best Sex Writing 2010 with Cleis and my guest judge Esther Perel. If you submitted and are waiting to hear back from me, I will respond within one month from now (and thanks for your patience).

One of the things I want to put on bestsexwriting.com, in addition to highlighting the previous year's editions (including the ones edited by Violet Blue and Cleis publishers Felice Newman and Frédérique Delacoste), is what I look for from pieces I include. To briefly sum it up: writing about sex that says something new, something bold and daring, something insightful. Something that perks me up and makes me pay attention. Something that unnerves me or delights me - or both!

5) No one has ever claimed that Georgia is a haven for the LGBT community. But a recent decision by a custody judge to bar a gay dad from “exposing” his kids to his “homosexual partners and friends,” is a reminder that in this state, the notion that everyone is equal under the law only applies if the “everyone” in question isn't gay. In this case, the man’s soon to be ex-wife argued that the fact that her kids have a gay dad has landed them in therapy. So she asked that the restriction be imposed to protect them from discomfort. But as the father said, “In general, that [restriction] will never allow me to have my children present in front of any friends, whether they’re gay or straight -- no one hands you a card saying are you gay, straight, heterosexual, bi, whatever.”

6) After his boxers were spotted by cops as he peddled his bike around town, a twenty-four-year-old Bainbridge, Georgia man became the first person arrested there under a new city ordinance that prohibits wearing pants low enough to expose a person’s underwear. Arrests like this have become common all over the country as more and more cities adopt such so-called baggy pants bans. But it isn't only men who are targeted by these laws. This June, the city of Yakima, Washington, voted to change the city's indecent exposure laws to include "cleavage of the buttocks." This means that women whose thong or G-string show can now be fined $1,000 or face up to 90 days in jail. If a child under the age of 14 is thought to be a victim of this form of indecent exposure, the perpetrator is looking at a $5,000 fine and up to a year in jail. Still while most cities choose to focus on legislating visible underwear, some laws take the clothing restrictions even further. For example, an ordinance passed in Lafourche Parish, Louisiana in 2007, not only outlaws “any indecent exposure of any person or undergarments,” but also bars a person from, “dressing in a manner not becoming to his or her sex.

It's not that men and women write about sex differently. I've read male erotica writers who are all about context, all about emotion. I've read women writers who are about nothing more than scratching the itch. Every writer brings their own understanding of sex to the table when they write about it. The best ones can suck you into a glimpse of their sexual space and turn you on there.

Dinosaurs like Copstick need to go away. This isn't about gender, and it hasn't been for years. And that the magazine doesn't even has on online edition of its own speaks volumes about the stuck-in-the-seventies mentality resident there.

I'm waiting to hear back about my story "Secret Service," which is a finalist for Violet Blue's anthology Best Women's Erotica 2010. Fingers crossed! Once I hear, I will give a little background on the story; I'm really proud of it. I actually hadn't submitted to this most excellent series the last two years because I didn't have stories that were just right, at least to me, meaning ones that were daring enough. I had tried to write my bukkake story that wound up in X: The Erotic Treasury for it but it wound up only partially done by deadline time. Probably the only story of mine to reference/use cocaine as inspiration (I don't mean that in the way it probably comes across, but I don't want to spoil the story).

Either way, it's a stunning book cover, one of many stunning ones Cleis has lined up for later this year.

I’m on deadline for Best Sex Writing 2010 and have a bazillion things I want/need to write, so will try to make this quick.

Sometimes I think email is the bane of my existence, certainly, this week it is. Last night, as I settled into the second row of Walter Reade Theater at the Film Society of Lincoln Center to watch the documentary In The Holy Fire of Revolution, starring former World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov, armed with popcorn and a cupcake, I realized I had a voicemail. Someone wanted to know why I hadn’t answered their email that day…about meeting up that night. Only, our meeting was for the 22nd. I knew that because I’d reread our emails and while I should have responded immediately, but got distracted, I knew we had time. So I had to rush out of the theater to text this person about it. All worked out, but an added bit of stress.

I was already stressed because of another set of email exchanges that kindof led me to believe that working with friends is just plain wrong and inevitably leads to problems. It sucks but at least that immediate fire is now put out.

I also am revising my idea that I am such a great professional matchmaker. Part of me loves it…but not when you then wind up the go between in a “what does this email mean?” “What does this online posting mean?” I basically had to explain/defend these two people I respect and admire to each other, wasting way more of my time than I thought a simple “Here’s her email address” would do.

Last week, my issue was people who think my job is to do their job. I don’t mind if an editor asks for a recommendation, if I know someone, especially if it’s someone I’ve worked with and want to help out. I do mind when I writer I don’t know writes to me and says, “Hi, ___ referred me to you. I accepted an assignment for a magazine on a topic I don’t actually know anything about. Can you give me some examples of ____?” I mean, WTF is that?

Someone else emailed me on Facebook the most cryptic message ever. “There’s this ___ event.” It went on to talk about the event and “mainstream reporting.” I literally had no idea why he was telling me this or what the “favor” alluded to in the email was. If you have a favor, rather than annoying someone with endless back and forth emails, just freaking ask it.

If I sound grouchy, it’s not because I never have to ask people favors, it’s more this culture of intense internet laziness/expecting people to do your work for you that seeps up increasingly more and more of my time. I know I need to learn how to shut off email/Internet/everything in order to write. I’m trying. Last week I was all about trying to get one publishable piece sent out every day. Then, well, I stopped. I was fired up from reading Hugh MacLeod’s excellent Ignore Everybody: and 39 Other Keys to Creativity, which I’ll post a formal review of soon. I don’t hate email; in fact, today I was asked by an interviewer for Danish Elle, “What would your life be like without the Internet?” I couldn’t answer her. I mean, what? I truly don’t know, since the large majority of my personal and professional life is conducted online. (She did ask me how often I have sex, and I answered that one! I think it comes out in September, will post a link--and my response to that questio--then.)

Friday, June 12, 2009

I'm going through submissions for Please, Sir, and have been pretty disappointed that about half the submissions I received were incorrectly formatted. (I say that to emphasize it's not just one or two, that wouldn't be the end of the world, but about half, and this is an ongoing problem - my guidelines are so long because every time I put out a call I see the same errors over and over, and it's, frankly, annoying.) I give people a pass if it's the first time submitting to me, but I wanted to share why this is so frustrating and time-consuming for me.

You might think, so what? The writing is what matters. But actually, the formatting is what first grabs my eye and when I have to manually indent paragraphs and reformat spacing and all those things that are clearly stated in my guidelines, it's a giant waste of time.

Then I'm in the bind of asking someone to reformat when I may not even want their story, or doing it myself, or just reading it with the incorrect formatting and deciding then.

It's not that it's necessarily a dealbreaker, it's more than cumulatively, when half of submissions have not followed the guidelines, it makes it much easier for me as a busy person to look at the ones that are formatted correctly. I would never sacrifice quality over formatting, but at the same time, I do a silent, non-moving jump for joy when I see a writer whose work I like and have published before...and know they have formatted it correctly before I even open it.

I in no way want to discourage people from submitting to my books. With the next few I'm editing for Cleis Press, I hope that, like with Peep Show, I can include writers I've never published before. I would love to read more stories like Elizabeth Coldwell's - she's someone whose work is relatively new to me but each time is just perfect. See "Lunch" in Yes, Sir for an example. That's what I'm looking for with Please, Sir (not literally that concept again, just writing as fine as that).

Anyway, I'm excited about the Please, Sir and Please, Ma'am books and a few others I'm working on, but just wanted to emphasize that guidelines, mine, anyway, really are there for a reason. I'd soooooo much rather someone ask a question if they don't understand something in them than send me something that will take me time to reconfigure before I even get a chance to read the story!

I'll end on a happy note: The deadline for these books is July 1st and both are wide open. I'm reading stories early and definitely need more.

I will never forget seeing my very first anthology inclusion, in Best Lesbian Erotica 2001, in a bookstore. I teared up. It was very exciting. Almost ten years later, I am still trying to push myself as an erotica writer, to go new places with my stories, to go deeper, darker, less light, like that first one, "Monica and Me," more serious. Personal, sometimes, yes, but also so not about me at all, like this story. And breaking into new markets, like this, and Black Lace, means the world to me. It means I've evolved, that I'm not just writing the same story over and over again, which I feared I was doing for a while. I'm so honored to be included with such stellar company, and thank editor Richard Labonté and guest judge Blair Mastbaum for deeming my story "Better Late Than Never" (with a bisexual, or at least, divorced from a woman, protagonist) worthy of inclusion. I'll share a preview of my story closer to the pub date in December.

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

I think I blogged about this before, but I was reminded of it because I'm getting postcards made in preparation for the publication of Bottoms Up: Spanking Good Stories (and plotting the book trailer), and was reminded again of my major failure with this book: I never heard back from anyone at Cleansheets about reprinting the excellent spanking erotica story "Bottoms Up" by Clive Dixon, and have no idea who "Clive Dixon" is. Authors: this is a good reason to have contact info when you publish, because you never know who wants to buy your work!

Despite that, the book is really hot and really strong. Here's a snippet from my story "The Spanking Machine:"

I opted for the Robospanker, because it offered the most intense, hard spanking. I loved the fact that it wouldn’t let up until I told it to, giving me the chance to top from below, which is what I tend to do anyway. Spanking is one of those activities that you just can’t provide for yourself, even with your own hand. So I was willing to set the scene, as long as the machine did the work of making me whimper, making my ass burn, making my pussy throb in the way that only a good spanking can do.

For a moment, as my finger hovered over the PURCHASE NOW button, I had my doubts. It might be 2009, but what would a new lover say if he came over and saw that this machine was his competition? Men are squeamish enough about vibrators, even the battery-operated kind, and this wasn’t the kind of toy I could shove into any drawer or closet, and since I live in Manhattan, I don’t exactly have much by way of storage space. I pictured the scene: a stud and I hot to trot, then he sees this contraption. I could say it was an exercise bench, I supposed. And then I slipped my fingers into my frilly white panties, and pictured my olive-colored ass turned a dusky rose, making the contrast against these very same panties even more intense. Tears sprang to my eyes as I tried to recall when I’d last gotten spanked. Oh yes, Raphael; he’d gotten tired of my constant lateness and hurled me across his lap, ripped my fishnets and panties, and pounded my bottom with his hand until I banged against the floor with my fists, until I almost couldn’t take it anymore, flirting on the edge of giving up. My cunt danced with excitement as I recalled his anger, and I pressed the button, setting the transaction in motion. Of course, a machine wasn’t going to get angry with me, but that part I could supply for myself.

Waiting for it was like having a long-distance lover and pining for his arrival. Every day without it felt shallow and empty to the point that even my clients noticed. “Claire, I think you need to get laid,” one of the most famous actresses in the world said to me and I knew she was right; she just didn’t know how right. The day the machine was set to arrive, I called in sick and waited anxiously. I couldn’t risk my new master being misdelivered or, heaven forbid, the doorman peering too closely at the box and wondering what exactly it contained. Even though I’m sure the neighbors in my upscale high-rise have heard plenty of moaning, yelling, and spanking coming from behind my door, I’ve never out and out admitted that I’m the girl in twelve-D who likes to get spanked, who likes to role-play, who lets her lovers use and abuse all her orifices after a good, hard smackdown; who loves to wince the next day as she sits down in her skirt suits, wondering if the men who sit across from her at meetings or lunches, the reporters who press her for details, know exactly what’s caused the expression on her face. What I do inside the confines of my well-upholstered apartment is my business.

I've read Lauren Baratz-Logsted's YA novel Angel's Choice, about a straight-A high school student who gets pregnant and decides to have the baby, and really enjoyed it. So her new YA novel Crazy Beautiful is already on my Amazon wishlist, but now there's a contest at excellent YA review site The Story Siren to win a copy. Enter today!

Crazy Beautiful is a contemporary re-visioning of Beauty & the Beast, told in he-said/she-said fashion, about a boy with hooks for hands and a gorgeous girl who meet on their first day at a new school.

Molly Landreth and Amelia Tovey are touring America looking at queer life. I saw this and fell in love with the photo above, and Molly said I could post it. Then I looked at the actual post and saw it's the Mile Hi Hotel! How perfect - combining my love for hotels and the mile high club.

Here's how they describe their art project, Embodiment: A Portrait of Queer Life in America:

WEare 2 girls on the road for 1 month, creating a portrait of what it means to be GLBTTQ(Queer) in America today. To see portraits from the work in progress click HERE!We're on Facebook, Myspace, Twitter!

And guess what? You can participate! Send them a postcard or a story - see the right-hand side of their blog for details. In the meantime, Molly, great photo - it makes me want to go there!

In the Flesh is a monthly reading series hosted at the appropriately named Happy Ending Lounge, and features the country's best erotic writers sharing stories to get you hot and bothered, hosted and curated by acclaimed erotic writer and editor Rachel Kramer Bussel. From erotic poetry to down and dirty smut, these authors get naked on the page and will make you lust after them and their words. Since its debut in October 2005, In the Flesh has featured such authors as Laura Antoniou, Mo Beasley, Susie Bright, Lily Burana, Jessica Cutler, Stephen Elliott, Valerie Frankel, Polly Frost, Gael Greene, Andy Horwitz, Debra Hyde, Maxim Jakubowski, Emily Scarlet Kramer of CAKE, Josh Kilmer-Purcell, Edith Layton, Logan Levkoff, Suzanne Portnoy, Sofia Quintero, M.J. Rose, Lauren Sanders, Danyel Smith, Grant Stoddard, Cecilia Tan, Carol Taylor, Dana Vachon, Veronica Vera, Susan Wright, Zane and many others. The series has gotten press attention from the New York Times’s UrbanEye, Escape (Hong Kong), Flavorpill, The L Magazine, New York Magazine, New York Observer, Philadelphia City Paper, Time Out New York, Gothamist, Nerve.com and Wonkette, and has been praised by Dr. Ruth.

Rachel Kramer Bussel is an author, editor, blogger and reading series host. She is Senior Editor at Penthouse Variations and a former sex columnist for The Village Voice. She’s edited numerous anthologies, two of which (Up All Night and Glamour Girls) have been Lambda Literary Award finalists, most recently The Mile High Club: Plane Sex Stories, Do Not Disturb: Hotel Sex Stories, Best Sex Writing 2009, Tasting Him, Tasting Her, and Spanked. Her writing been published in publications such as Clean Sheets, Cosmopolitan, The Daily Beast, Fresh Yarn, Huffington Post, Mediabistro, Newsday, New York Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Tango, The Village Voice, and Time Out New York, and in over 100 anthologies, including Best American Erotica 2004 and 2006. She has hosted In The Flesh since October 2005.www.rachelkramerbussel.com

Diana Cage is the author of three hilarious books on sex and dating: Girl Meets Girl: A Dating Survival Guide, Box Lunch: The Layperson’s Guide to Cunnilingus, and Threeways: Fulfill Your Ultimate Fantasy. She is the former host of The Diana Cage Show on Sirius XM and still pops up on the radio a couple of times a month to give advice on sex and love to lonelyhearts everywhere. Her writing has appeared in countless journals, anthologies and magazines and she currently writes on sex and politics for Shewired and Velvetpark. She is featured in the Here! Television series Lesbian Sex and Sexuality, and is now trying to figure out what's left to write about.www.dianacage.com

Kelli Dunham is a genderqueer Fresh Fruit award-winning comic, ex-nun and a Wisconsin farmgrrl gone very bad. She has two comedy CDs to her credit: I am NOT a 12 Year Old Boy and Almost Pretty and is the co-producer of Gayety, Brooklyn's experimental queer comedy cabaret. She is on the organizing board of the Butch Voices(www.butchvoices.com) and is the author of four published books of light hearted nonfiction and a frequent contributor to humorous anthologies. She is currently touring Pudding Day, an irreverent one boi show about her partner's struggle with cancer. In June she is launching the first of episode of Queerhouse Rock, an animated parody of the 1970 kids' cartoon series Schoolhouse Rock. She has performed at the Risque strip club in Philadelphia, at numerous churches, Lacrosse Wisconsin Pride, and a livestock auction. She once taught a nun to masturbate. With great success.www.kellidunham.com

Madlyn March is the pseudonym of a writer whose work has appeared in the anthology First-Timers, Black Table, AfterEllen, AfterElton, Complete Woman, The New York Post, Time Out New York, and others. Toni is based on a bully who once tortured her, but the sexual part is all wishful thinking.

Kimberly "Q" (aka The Lesbian Goddess) is the writer, creator and author of Orchids: African American Lesbian Erotica One Night Stands, Orchids II: Reality or Fantasy and her just released Lesbian Funk A Journey Into The Oblivion. She formed her company Women of Choice to signify the choices of life that we as women dare to explore with a mission to go beyond the realm of women's comfort zones and normalcy by providing them with exotic adventures, unexplained pleasures, new and exciting ideas and inexplicable desires. Her books are episodes presented to entice, entertain and broaden the thoughts, actions and creativity of the lesbian sexual experience. www.womenofchoice.com

Rob Stephenson's novel Passes Through will be published by Fiction Collective 2 in Spring of 2010. His novella U will be published later that year by Rebel Satori Press : Queer Mojo. Rob and Mikael Karlsson have made a CD called dog, now available from Please MusicWorks. They are currently working on new music that will be part of the Terry Riley Remixed CD released later this year by Innova Recordings.

Xan West is the pseudonym of an NYC BDSM and sex educator and writer. Xan's work can be found in Best SM Erotica 2, Got A Minute?, Love at First Sting, Best Women's Erotica 2008 and 2009, Men on the Edge, Leathermen, Backdraft: Firemen Erotica, DADDIES, Frenzy, Best Gay Erotica 2009, and the upcoming Cruising for Bad Boys, Pleasure Bound, and Sextime. Xan's story, "First Time Since", printed in Hurts So Good, won honorable mention for the 2008 National Leather Association's John Preston Short Fiction Award. Xan wants to hear from you, and can be found at xanwest.livejournal.com/ or emailed at xan_west at yahoo.com.

First let me say that R. Gay is one of my very favorite erotica writers. I've been reading her work for a long time, I think for as long as I've been writing erotica (1999), or it feels like that, and have publisher her many times. Basically, I always hope she will send me a story for my anthologies. Look for her work - she's amazing.

Secondly, well, my life is kindof one big girl crush, almost always on straight, or "straight," or straightish, or bi, or bicurious girls. Maybe because I tend to fall for femmes, or some other mysterious reason, but I invariably fall hard for girls who are slightly out of reach. Except sometimes they're not. I already have the perfect, and perfectly true, story mapped out in my mind. I'm working on a story for College Boys but am looking forward to submitting to Girl Crush. I urge you to as well.

Girl CrushEdited by R. GayTo be published by Cleis Press in Spring 2010

Every woman has a girl crush—that intriguing, provocative woman about whom she can’t resist fantasizing—the woman who makes her wonder, what if? The forthcoming anthology Girl Crush, will answer that question, through a unique range of erotic short stories about women acting on their girl crushes.

I am looking for literary, well-written, explicit stories about what happens when girl crush fantasies come true. Consider stories about women who might be straight, scratching an itch during a sexy one-time encounter or stories about women who explore new opportunities and perhaps discover that they aren’t so straight after all. Guidelines for this collection are very flexible. I want to be surprised. The usual taboos apply—no incest, characters under the age of 18 or bizarre acts involving animals because that’s just not very nice. Think of the puppies.

Minutiae: Stories should be unpublished; query if you have a reprint that you think I absolutely must see. Stories should be 1,500 – 4,000 words, and submitted as a Word attachment. Please include a cover letter with a brief bio and full contact information (mailing address, phone number, real name/pseudonym) when you submit. Submissions without complete contact information will be deleted unread.

Payment will be $50/story and 2 copies of the book upon publication in Spring 2010. Contributors retain the rights to their stories. You may submit up to three stories per book. Important: Please note that the publisher has final approval over the manuscript.

Send your submission as a Word document to girlcrushbook@gmail.com. Please submit no more than three (3) stories.

If you have any questions about Girl Crush, please query girlcrushbook@gmail.com

Deadline: August 1, 2009Manuscripts will be accepted on a rolling basis, so writers are encouraged to submit sooner than later.Payment: $50/story, upon publication $25/reprint; upon publicationEmail: girlcrushbook at gmail.com

Journalist and former Larry King Live producer Carol Ross Joynt's INNOCENT SPOUSE, a story about marital secrets and financial infidelity that recounts the author's attempts to pick up the pieces of her shattered life when, after her husband's sudden death, she learns that he was under investigation by the IRS for tax fraud and, as his surviving spouse, she is responsible for repaying his debt of over $2.5 million, to Suzanne O'Neill at Crown, at auction, by Laney Katz Becker at Folio Literary Management (NA).

Wednesday, June 03, 2009

Taken at the IPPY (Independent Book Publishing) Awards on Friday. Once I get this latest round of erotica done, I will be brainstorming some new ideas. LOTS of writing to be done the rest of this year, which I'm nervous/excited about.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009

In honor of National Ice Cream Week in the UK, Del Monte Superfruit Smoothies has sculpted a limited edition popsicle in the shape of Daniel Craig's nude torso. The frozen treat -- said to come in blueberry, pomegranate, and cranberry flavors and be under 100 calories each -- is the result of a poll of more than 1,000 women, the majority of whom wanted the image of Craig, emerging from the water in Casino Royale, immortalized.

Publishing fascinates me, completely. I love walking into a bookstore and just browsing, seeing what catches my eye. I have read part of Ruth Fowler's memoir No Man's Land and found the writing outstanding - rich and deep and intense, about both stripping and New York. I plan to finish it soon; I have a little book problem, in which I start them and don't finish them. Fowler is the formerly anonymous blogger known as Mimi in New York, who also wrote for The Village Voice and The Guardian, and also got mentioned in some of the umpteen blogger book deal articles that were all the rage.

So I wonder if this will work, this play on Girl, Interrupted, the bolder, brighter color of the cover and...drawn-on boobs?

I've posted a whole bunch of In The Flesh videos from recent months on the site and on YouTube. I'm posting Mara Altman's sacred whore ass-eating story from her orgasm memoir Thanks for Coming and Craig Yoe's amazing Superman fetish art PowerPoint presentation below. Also, if you want an In The Flesh postcards (U.S. only), just email your mailing address to me at rachelravenous at gmail.com - these cover June, July and August (September 17th was going to be Spanking Night, but now features Speed Shrinking author Susan Shapiro and Loose Girl author Kerry Cohen, among others, spanking will be later in the year).

Key phrase in Mara Altman's reading from her memoir Thanks for Coming: "beer can of a cock."

After some technical difficulties on my end, we got PowerPoint up and running and Craig Yoe, author of Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Superman's Co-creator Joe Shuster, gave one of the most delightful, hilarious, and fun presentations I've seen in my three and a half years running In The Flesh. Thank you, Craig, for such a fantastic presentation. Watch it now:

I'm racing to put the finishing touches on Best Sex Writing 2010 and then I'll be waiting for the guest judge and my publisher to approve it. Fingers crossed I can get it all sorted out next week. I'm reading Lisa M. Diamond's excellent though very scientific/academic Sexual Fluidity: Understanding Women's Love and Desire, which I am hoping to excerpt from. Anyway, I have these two calls out and would love to see your stories. Please make sure to read and follow all directions if you submit!

I got an email from a man who told me he and his wife took Spanked and Do Not Disturb away with them and read erotica to each other while getting it on in a hotel room. HOT!

I also got the latest catalog from my publisher, Cleis Press, and omg have they pulled out all the stops with the gorgeous covers, especially Best Lesbian Erotica 2010, which has a stunning black and white cover and will have the band BETTY as guest judge. It's the first edition edited by Kathleen Warnock (my lesbian pregnancy/travel erotica story "Swollen" is a finalist - fingers crossed).

So please submit stories, pass this on, etc. Stories should be from the point of view of the submissive, but beyond that, and the usual no underage/bestiality/nonconsent, anything goes. I don't like to be too too specific about "what I want" in my erotica calls in terms of topics because then I get inundated with stories about those things, and I can't use them all, so all I can really say (well, beyond what's below) is be creative! I'll also say that I used a lot of new (to me) authors in Peep Show (click for Table of Contents) and hope to keep doing so in my upcoming anthologies.

These two companion anthologies will explore the power dynamics of BDSM from the sub's/bottom's point of view. For an idea of the kinds of stories I like, please read my recent anthologies Yes, Sir: Erotic Stories of Female Submission and Yes, Ma’am: Erotic Stories of Male Submission. I strongly prefer modern settings, though have included the occasional historical piece. Futuristic/science fiction settings are almost never my cup of tea.

Please, Sir: What's it like to be a female submissive, whether a full-time slave to a powerful master, or a kinky woman involved in an intense scene? These stories should explore the range of ways women submit to men, whether masters, husbands, boyfriends, play dates, strangers, internet chatters, etc. Is the storyteller a lifelong bottom, or a new convert to kink? Does merely offering herself up to any guy get her off, or does something about this particular top excite her? Can be long- or short-term relationships, single encounters, or anything in between, as long as the characters and plot are believable and the story is hot. (I don't want simple snapshots of scenes that don't tell us anything about the characters' motivation.) Story should be from the point of view of a female masochist and or submissive/bottom, though it can be told from a first, second or third person POV (first is preferred).

Please, Ma’am: What makes a man cower before a powerful woman? Is he living out a lifelong fantasy, or has he always taken the submissive role with women? I want stories of sissy maids, hardcore masochists, visits with dommes, husbands completely devoted to their wives, full-time slaves, play partners, and much more. These can be long- or short-term relationships, single encounters, professionals, etc., as long as the characters and plot are believable and the story is hot. (I don't want simple snapshots of scenes that don't tell us anything about the characters' motivation.) Story should be from the point of view of a male masochist or submissive/bottom, though it can be told from a first, second or third person POV (first is preferred).

Both anthologies will feature stories from a wide spectrum of the BDSM world. The more creative your storytelling, the better. The examples listed above are just that, examples; feel free to let your imaginations run wild! I encourage you to think beyond clichéd scenarios and set your stories outside of the traditional play parties/dungeons, as well as thinking outside the box when it comes to "power play" and am especially looking for stories where not all of the erotic action is centered around physical sensation. There can also be more than two people in a given story or scene (or even just one if they are following someone's orders), and bisexual scenarios are welcome as long as the bottom/top relationship is a heterosexual one, as fitting the title. My biggest pet peeve with the submissions I’ve rejected in the past is lack of characterization/jumping into the BDSM scene too quickly.

Guidelines: Stories should be unpublished and not submitted elsewhere for publication. Stories should be 1,500 – 4,000 words, double spaced, Times New Roman 12 point font, in a Word document only. If it is truly impossible to send a Word document, please send as both a RTF AND in the body of the email. You MUST include your bio (50 words MAX) and full contact info (mailing address, phone number, real name/pseudonym) when you submit.

Payment will be $50/story and 1 copy of the book upon publication in Spring 2010. Contributors will retain the rights to their stories. You may submit up to two stories per book. Please note that the publisher has final approval over the manuscript.

Send your submission as a Word document to pleaseantho@gmail.com ONLY with either"Please, Sir Submission" or "Please, Ma’am Submission" in the subject line—if you are submitting to both anthologies, please send separate submissions for each (though you can attach 2 stories for one book in the same email).

Please make sure to follow ALL directions. I'm getting a lot of single-spaced, non-Word document submissions without bios or mailing addresses. Please also make sure you send your FINAL version of your story, not a first (and then second or third) draft. All of the pertinent information, including a polished version of the story and your bio/contact info should be included in a single email, not multiple ones. Thank you.

If you have any questions about Please, Ma’am or Please, Sir, please querypleaseantho@gmail.com

Deadline: July 1, 2009Expect to hear back from me by November 2009Payment: $50/story, upon publicationEmail: pleaseantho@gmail.com